A surface constraint in Xitsonga: *Li

This paper proposes a surface constraint against the phonotactic sequence [ li] in Xitsonga. This constraint is supported by multiple lines of synchronic and diachronic evidence, individually identified in some previous work (Baumbach 1974, 1987 ; du Plessis et al. 1995) and supported in our own data. We observe that a synchronic change of / l/ to [ r] before [ i]— apparent in a wide range of morphemes— dovetails with lexical occurrence restrictions, as well as diachronic changes that removed historical / li/ sequences from the language. We understand these various strategies for avoiding surface [ li] sequences as a case of ‘ Heterogeneity of Process/ Homogeneity of Target’ (‘ HOP-HOT’) in the sense of Optimality Theory (Prince & Smolensky 1993/ 2004), and argue that it provides evidence for a phonological framework based on ranked, violable constraints.